


sometimes, curiosity gets the job done

by multifandommania



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, BAMF Dai-nana-han | Team 7 (Naruto), BAMF Haruno Sakura, BAMF Hatake Kakashi, BAMF Uchiha Sasuke, BAMF Uzumaki Naruto, Butterfly Effect, Character Development, Communication, Dai-nana-han | Team 7 as Family (Naruto), Fluff, Gen, Good Uchiha Sasuke, Hatake Kakashi is a Good Teacher, Healing, POV Haruno Sakura, POV Hatake Kakashi, POV Uchiha Sasuke, POV Uzumaki Naruto, Smart Haruno Sakura, Team Bonding, Team as Family, because team 7 grows on him, soon, well a gradual one
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-07
Updated: 2020-08-14
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:42:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24585523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/multifandommania/pseuds/multifandommania
Summary: What if Sakura had used her amazing brain just a little bit more when she was beside her crush?Alternatively, Team 7 gets the opportunity to know more about their sensei before their bell test.
Relationships: Dai-nana-han | Team 7 & Hatake Kakashi, Haruno Sakura & Hatake Kakashi & Uchiha Sasuke & Uzumaki Naruto, Haruno Sakura & Uchiha Sasuke & Uzumaki Naruto
Comments: 32
Kudos: 429





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The brainwaves were hitting me hard, so here it is.

Sakura’s POV

The moment her sensei had said his name when he introduced himself, Sakura had felt a sense of deja vu.

Well, she was supposed to know his name since Iruka-sensei announced the team groupings and their sensei's name during class, but well, she had just found out she was going to be in a team with Sasuke-kun. 

When Naruto was yapping on about himself, she tuned out and started to day-dream about how her amazing crush was going to save her from enemy-nin while professing his undying love to her when her thoughts were broken by Inner-Sakura’s “Haha! Ino-pig will be stewing in jealousy for the rest of her life!”

Oh right! Where was she again? Yes, her sensei’s name that seemed vaguely familiar to her. She started to devote a part of her thinking to rack her brain about the sense of deja vu, while she mainly listened to Sasuke-kun introducing himself. Sigh, he was so cool.

However, when she felt that the answer was at the tip of her tongue, she started to think more furiously while letting Inner-Sakura listen to what was going on during the meeting. Sakura had the best test scores in the Academy and no way was she going to let a simple name beat her, shannaro!

Suddenly, a loud “Sakura-chan!!! What are you thinking about!” jolted her out of her thoughts. As she got back her bearing, she quickly scanned her environment. She had been called by Naruto whose face was right beside her right ear, while Sasuke-kun was standing still next to him, his body turned towards the stairways leading to the ground floor. Oh, her sensei was gone too, but she could ask Inner to fill her in about what happened later.

She had almost instinctively punched Naruto away from her when Inner-Sakura intervened. “Outer! Look! Sasuke-kun is actually waiting for our answer. Don’t punch the baka and answer the question. Maybe this is our chance of finally carrying out a conversation with him!” her gleeful crackle reverberated in Sakura’s mind.

Almost pouting, Sakura regretfully unclenched her fist. She exhaled and said, “Hatake Kakashi. I’ve heard of the name somewhere before.”

“Tch, that’s it? There are thousands of shinobi part of the Konoha military force. You’re bound to hear names of jounin all the time,” Sasuke-kun rebutted back with annoyance while he started to move towards the stairways.

“Shut up, Sasuke-teme! If Sakura-chan remembers something, it must be important!” Naruto screamed.

Oh no! Sakura was quickly losing her chance to talk to her crush. With Inner-Sakura urging her on, she intercepted Naruto before he could blow up her chance, and said, “Well Sasuke-kun, my parents are both civilians, so the only chance of me knowing the names of active shinobi other than Hokage-sama, Ino-pig’s father and all our academy sensei, is if I had read about it as part of the school curriculum.”

“That’s impossible. The only part of the lessons where we are introduced to names of shinobi are during the history lessons. The latest topic was on the Third Shinobi World War, which ended around 14 years ago. There’s no way any of the jonin sensei were old enough to participate, let alone make a name that important to the village by themselves,” Sasuke-kun declared.

It was as if a metaphorical light bulb had gone off in her mind after flickering for several minutes. Sakura stood up lightning fast, so much so that Naruto toppled away from her in surprise. “Sasuke-kun, you genius!” she shouted in joy. He looked taken aback.

“Of course, how could I forget about the history lessons?!”, she muttered furiously to herself as she rushed towards the stairs, wanting to go back to the classroom. As she rushed by, she saw Sasuke-kun’s eyebrows furrowed in a look of curiosity while hearing Naruto shouting about something behind her.

She hastened down the flight of stairs and into her classroom while she noticed two sets of footsteps following her vaguely at the back of her mind. Her brilliant mind was mainly focused on recalling her history book and notes. Oh yes! The Kannabi Bridge section! One of the sections which Iruka-sensei skipped due to lack of time and an increase in focus on practical skills towards the graduation exam. 

Of course, Sakura being a model student had already read through her history book before the school year started, but did not refresh her memory of that particular section towards exam season. That explained why she could recognise but could not accurately remember her sensei’s name or why he was part of the history books, that usually only legendary shinobi are part of. 

As she reached Iruka sensei’s desk, she quickly reached the table and tugged out the history textbook that Iruka-sensei had always placed in a drawer. Flipping through the pages, she had just reached that particular section when Sasuke-kun and Naruto arrived next to her.

Oh kami! Sasuke-kun actually listened to her and was interested in what she was doing. She felt as if she had entered the twilight zone and desperately wanted to pinch herself to confirm that she was not dreaming. Cha! She was not going to mess up this god given chance, even if she had to put up with Naruto-baka.

She scanned the page and a tidal wave of vindication enveloped her. Her pointer finger was resting on the name Hatake Kakashi. As she tilted her head up, she could her crush’s face morph into a look of surprise and she could only feel more smug.

Just then, Sasuke-kun started reading the relatively small paragraph. “While not as well known as the Yellow Flash’s massacre of one thousand Iwa shinobi during the war, the Kannabi Bridge mission was an important catalyst to the end of the third shinobi war. A team of three shinobi, led by leaf jounin, Hatake Kakashi, age 10, managed to destroy the Kannabi bridge which was part of an essential supply route for Iwa. This was a pivotal moment in the war, causing the tides to turn in Konoha’s favour eventually leading to our victory. This was an impressive achievement by Hatake Kakashi, prized pupil of our Yondaime, given that this was his first mission as team leader and he completed the mission with just a single causality on his team.”

Sakura could only feel numb with shock as Sasuke-kun trailed off at the end of the paragraph. Just who was her sensei?! Jounin at ten, probably had a kill count of who knows how many by then, a student of the Yondaime, had experienced the loss of a comrade by at least ten years old… which part was she supposed to focus on? Looking at her teammates, she could see identical looks of absolute shock plastered on their faces.

Sakura felt lost, like she went too deep into a labyrinth and could not for the life of her find the way out.


	2. Chapter 2

Sasuke's POV

Uchiha Sasuke was completely and utterly stunned. He stood completely still, his body rooted to the ground and frozen in shock. His head was spinning, like how it would after Shisui-nii would bring Sasuke around Konoha with his ridiculously fast shunshins.

He simply could not, in fact he refused to, wrap his mind around this tidbit of information. But it was staring right at him. As if he had suddenly become partially illiterate, the number 10 and the words ‘jounin’ and ‘student of the Yondaime’ seemed to be the only words he could read an entire page full of text.

Because if this was true, then the jounin sensei assigned to Team 7 might actually be able to teach him the necessary skills for Sasuke to survive, to avenge, to bring justice to his clan. 

Sasuke wasn’t a fool. During the introduction segment with Team 7, he may have fooled everyone with the act of being confident that he would kill Itachi, but he could never convince himself.

Because only he knew of the sleepless nights, tossing and turning in his bed, surrounded by pin drop silence, alone in a house situated in the very centre of a ghost town, soil drenched in the blood of his kin.

When the pain of having lost his family wasn’t as agonising at times, he would read up some of his fathers’ notes, wanting to know about his clan what couldn’t as a young child. He learned that on the night of the massacre, the Uchiha clan had boasted about 250 clans members, with a little over half of them being active shinobi. Around 25 jounin, 10 tokubetsu jounin, 70 chunin and 20 genin.

A 13 year old, just a scant year older than Sasuke’s current age, was able to take down so many elite shinobi, in the span of a single evening, while preventing anyone from contacting the village’s shinobi forces for backup. Gods, that man even had the time to monologue about wanting to test his strength and managed to stroll right out of the village, filled with trained assassins.

How was Sasuke ever going to reach that level of strength? He couldn’t even think about the question of how Itachi’s skill might have improved as he grew older, because that would… that would be too much to contemplate. Therefore, this new piece of information about Hatake Kakashi that Sakura dug up has begun to give rise to a dangerous feeling called hope in Sasuke’s heart.

This might mean that his sensei could actually be strong enough to teach Sasuke, strong enough for Sasuke to attempt to form a bond with, without Sasuke being worried out of his mind whether that man would come back to sever all the bonds Sasuke might build, drenching his blood soaked world with more of that damned thing.

And Sasuke didn’t know if he could go through that again. Because something all Uchiha had in common was that they loved too deeply.

Sasuke almost had to physically wrench himself from that train of thought as it was much too painful, too dangerous for him to continue. Taking in a ragged breath of air, he steeled himself. He needed to make sure, be completely sure that this information was right.

“What if,” his voice tapered off with quaver. Sasuke slowly inhaled and let the breath of air out of his lungs as he attempted to calm himself down. His hands tightened their hold on the history textbook, his knuckles bone white.

He tried again, “What if it’s a typo? What if his age was written wrongly? I mean it sounds impossible to be jounin at age 10.” Sasuke wasn’t sure he believed himself, but he had to confirm the fact. He would not, could not, allow himself to believe it without additional proof, because if this was true, then his entire worldview was about to be turned upside down.

He observed as Sakura’s expression on her face twisted from surprise to affront, probably at the idea that he was questioning the work of people of authority. Sasuke couldn’t care less about her opinions, he just needed to confirm this little fact. It was the next suggestion thrown out that took him by surprise for the second time that day.

“Eh, Sasuke-teme. I guess we could go to the staffroom? I mean if I want to prank people who are hard to prank, I usually look at their record files in that room. It has lots and lots of useful information about them. And, I saw Iruka-sensei’s academy file there, so there’s a chance that Kakashi-sensei’s academy file is there too? I bet if he was jounin at 10, then the age he graduated from the academy is maybe like 8 right?” Naruto voiced his thoughts out loud, while his right hand scratched the back of his blond-haired head.

Sasuke blinked, multiple times in fact. He may have also pinched himself in the arm, discreetly of course. 

That made a lot of sense, more than just taking the book at face value. However, he was taken aback by the source of the somewhat intelligent comment. However, he couldn’t ponder upon it much longer, giving into the overwhelming part of his brain that was instructing his legs to bring him to the staffroom.

Given that the graduating class had all been meeting their respective sensei, the academy teachers must have already left the building. Therefore, the staffroom was likely to be locked. 

Sasuke tilted his head up to spot the entry to the overhead ventilation shaft situated directly above him. Bending his knees and pumping chakra into his legs, he jumped and managed to hang onto the handle of the cover.

He turned a deaf ear to Naruto’s and Sakura’s identical shouts of exclamation as he unlocked the hatch, let the cover hang from one hinge and pulled himself into the vents in one smooth motion. Sasuke quickly crawled his way around the passageway until he found one of the exits that led to the staffroom. He removed the vent cover, and leaped silently onto the staffroom floor.

As he dusted off himself, Sasuke scanned his environment and his lips twitched slightly upwards as his eyes chanced upon the Academy Records shelf. As the records were not updated after each shinobi had graduated the Academy, it didn’t contain much confidential information and therefore, did not warrant as much protection. Hence, giving Sasuke easy access to the files.

Making his way towards the shelf, he could hear the dobe noisily making his way through the vents. Rolling his eyes, he observed that the Academy Records were stacked in chronological order, then for each year, arranged by alphabetical order.

Making an educated estimate, he started going backwards from the year before the Kyuubi Attack. However, with not even a full minute having passed since Sasuke started on his task, he was halted by Naruto’s loud screeching of “Hatake Kakashi! Haha teme, I found it! And guess what, I beat you to it!”, completed with the dobe blowing a raspberry at him.

Sasuke could feel the annoyance and anger starting to envelope him, but he cast those feelings aside and gritted his teeth. He hastened towards Naruto and yanked the file from his grip. As he flipped open the file, Naruto came to peak over his left shoulder while Sakura mirrored the dobe on Sasuke’s right.

He skimmed over the trivial admin matters, passively retaining the information, until his eyes rested on the undeniable proof. His pointer finger rested under the words, ‘Age of Konoha Academy Graduation: 5’.

Honestly speaking, although Sasuke would never admit this to anyone, Naruto’s loud “WHAT THE F*CK?!!” by his left ear, quite aptly summed up his feelings at that moment.

Well there goes any doubts on whether the age on the history book was a typo or not. Sasuke could feel the hysterical laughter building up in his lungs. For the longest time, he had thought that his brother was the pinnacle of shinobi strength. But, what he learned in just the last 10 minutes completely shattered his worldview.

Because that means that someone with the skills that should rival that of Itachi’s had been living in the very same village as him and Sasuke hadn’t known.

Kami, the survival test that was going to happen tomorrow! At first, Sasuke hadn’t been bothered by it because he was the best in his graduating class, and that meant that he definitely could make the top 33 percent in the survival test.

However, whatever he had just learned about his jounin sensei meant that Sasuke might not as easily take down the challenges thrown at him tomorrow as he thought. Because the person setting the test was a shinobi as skilled as that man. 

What if the test was too hard? What if Sasuke didn’t pass? That can never be the case!

“Then we’ll just take down whatever our sensei throws at us, as a team”, Naruto said in a unusually solemn voice, cutting off Sasuke’s train of thought.

It took a few moments, for Sasuke to realise that he had embarrassingly spoken his thoughts out loud due to being in a state of shock, and to process Naruto’s statement.

Fighting off a blush, Sasuke opened his mouth to immediately shoot down Naruto’s opinion, before his brain stopped him from doing so. Because rationally thinking, Naruto had made sense. It would be easier to complete any task handed to them if they worked together as a team.

However, could Sasuke actually go through with that? Accept Naruto’s offer?


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another unique revelation from the most unlikely of sources. Highly anticipated bell test will be part of the next chapter (because I need more time to type out fight scenes that don't immediately make me cringe with my horrible writing. trust me, you don't want to be subjected to reading my current drafts).

Naruto's POV

Naruto stood in trepidation as he waited for Sasuke’s reply. He was already shocked enough as it is, considering that Sasuke hadn’t immediately shot down Naruto’s suggestion. Furthermore, he could see Sakura also seeming like she was considering Naruto’s idea quite seriously on Sasuke’s other side.

In addition to the shock factor of the multiple mind-blowing revelations that he has faced today, Naruto was feeling much self-doubt. His sensei had been a jounin at 10 years old, and here he was, being 2 years older than his sensei had been and not even fully a genin yet. Considering that, could he still proclaim that he would be Hokage in future, when there were so many other powerful shinobi in the village?

“Tell me all the jutsus in your arsenals, as well as your strengths and weaknesses. I’m not agreeing to work as a team until I think that working as a team would be beneficial,” said Sasuke, finally coming to somewhat of an agreement with Naruto.

Excited that Sasuke was actually willing to work together with him, Naruto enthusiastically started listing the jutsu he knew.

“Oh! I know the henge, kawarimi and the sexy no jutsu. I can’t do the bunshin, but have no fear because Uzumaki Naruto can do the kage bunshin no jutsu!”, Naruto started off excitedly.

“Kage bunshin? What is that and why haven’t I heard of it?”, Sakura-chan asked impatiently.

Without thinking about it, Naruto opened his mouth to spill everything when he realised that by sharing it with his teammates would be tantamount to going against the Hokage’s orders. Thus, as much as he wanted to proclaim how he had defeated the traitor Mizuki, he couldn’t. Hence, he gave an alternative answer with the slightest amount of truth sprinkled in it.

“Ah, well Sakura-chan… Iruka-sensei told be that I had too much chakra to create a normal bunshin, so he taught be the kage-bunshin, a solid clone, so that I can pass the Academy exam,” Naruto responded, albeit nervously as he wasn’t saying the full truth.

“Alright, anything else you want to add?” Sasuke questioned.

“Ah, well, I scored the highest in class during the Trap Setting module. In fact, the old man Hokage himself fell for my prank recently!” Naruto added with a foxy grin.

Sasuke seemed to be mulling over these facts while Sakura-chan confidently denied that the great Hokage-sama wouldn’t fall for Naruto’s tricks.

“Haruno, what about you?” Sasuke cut her off impatiently. Sakura-chan looked startled, both pleased that her crush was addressing her and a bit intimidated that she was now under the spotlight of the conversation.

“Sasuke-kun, I can do the 3 Academy Jutus and I’m very book smart. I can handle any intelligence test our sensei might give us tomorrow,” she replied, fighting off a blush.

For the next few hours, the newly minted Team 7 brainstormed on what kinds of survival test might be thrown at them tomorrow and worked on team combinations to handle such situations. The three genin were so engaged in their conversation that they didn’t even realise that they were still in the staff room even as the sun went down.

“Um, since we worked hard on our plans today, could I treat you both to dinner? I promised the grandma from the sushi stall near the Academy that I’ll visit her after I met with my genin team,” Sakura-chan added shyly at the end of their discussions.

Naruto couldn't believe his own ears. Was he hearing things right? Did Sakura-chan actually ask him out for dinner? Well, she asked Sasuke-teme too, but Naruto could put up with him if it meant having dinner with his crush. Naruto nodded vigorously in agreement. Sasuke looked like he was going to decline rather impolitely, but a loud growl emitting from his stomach seemed to cut him off before he could even open his mouth.

“Teme, just come!” Naruto declared, while cackling. Naruto grabbed Sasuke by his forearm and dragged him towards the vent entry. Sasuke’s half-hearted protests behind him already told Naruto that Sasuke wasn’t completely against the idea of free food.

Fifteen minutes later, the 3 genins of Team 7 were seated at the sushi store with their orders being served to them.

“So Sakura-chan, this is your genin team, huh? I bet all three of you are going to break hearts when you grow up,” the granny added cheekily.

Naruto blushed heavily. He could see that his teammates were in the same state as him. However, the relief in knowing that he wasn’t going to be chased out of the store, and wasn’t going to be humiliated in front of his teammates, was eclipsing any embarrassment he felt. And for that he could only feel grateful.

“Who is your sensei? I might know him,” the old granny interjected between Sakura-chan’s denials.

When Sakura mentioned his name, the air turned solemn. The granny’s face had tightened with sadness, and maybe a bit of regret. Even Sasuke sat up straight and paid complete attention to the conversation.

“Hatake Kakashi,” the granny repeated softly, as if tasting it on her tongue after decades of disuse. Her smile had transformed into a slight frown as her face tightened.

“I think that boy has one of the most tragic backstories in the village. He used to be a regular customer at my store when he went to the Academy. He came here with his father for dinner at least once a week. Even though he was rough around the edges, anyone with a pair of eyes could see that the boy loved and respected his father,” the granny spoke with a soft smile.

“His father Hatake Sakumo, The White Fang, was a legendary ninja. People said that not only was he on par with the Sanin, he was also a good man. Perhaps his only flaw was that he didn’t choose the right friends. Therefore, when he chose to save the lives of his comrades over the mission, everyone turned their backs against him, even the people whose lives he saved. The constant ostracisation and disgust directed at him eventually drove him to take his own life. Not only was your sensei orphaned at such a young age, he had to deal with his father’s treatment directed towards him for years to come, until he managed to make himself powerful enough to be respected by the people,” the old granny divulged as her words echoed the depths of her grief.

Naruto felt like the air in his lungs was stuck in his chest. He couldn’t breathe as his mind struggled to process the shock, grief and anger after hearing about his sensei’s tough past. But, most of all, Naruto couldn’t believe that there was another person in this world who knew how it felt to be lonely, who knew how it felt to walk down the streets and be looked at with hateful eyes for merely existing.

Does this mean that Naruto could hope that his sensei wouldn’t sabotage his education like the bastard Mizuki did? Could he actually talk to someone on how to make people like him so that he wouldn’t be hated for simply breathing? The weight of these questions seem to be choking him.

Iruka-sensei was great, truly irreplaceable, but sometimes he didn’t get how Naruto was feeling. Because not even at the worst points of his life, was he treated like Naruto was all the time. Naruto was both terrified and in awe of the hope that seemed to be tentatively rising in his chest, like a sapling gently breaking out of the hard soil.


End file.
